February 2007

Pocket Lint, and all of it’s Wonderful Uses

stargrace February 15, 2007 3Comments

Wow, I wonder what could be made from this! Perhaps a dust bunny, or two!

Qutey brushed a strand of her coarse hair out of her eyes, the straw-like quality it had was becoming ever so annoying as she trekked through the region doing various odds and ends for whomever required her services. The goblin sighed. It was not exactly how she had envisioned her career as a pick pocket. Not that she really had pictured any sort of career from her talents – if they could be called that. The sun was setting, and she was ending yet another task that was required of her. All this to prove herself in the eyes of someone else who just simply didn’t matter that much.

She trudged up the kill, and glanced to the sky, asking for patience.

“Are you Qutey?” a raspy voice asked from her side.

“Err..” She stuttered, knowing very well she’d not given out her name. One of the first rules, after all.

“The Ancestral Spirits talk of you, whispering of great things you will do..” the voice hissed, and spittle flew from the strangers lips. They glanced at her as though they had very little faith in the Ancestral Spirits, and that perhaps they’d been mistaken of this goblin woman who stood hunched over absentmindedly brushing away invisible strands of hair.

“Well.. thanks.. I guess…” Qutey trailed off, unsure of what to say. This person was obviously a lunatic. Her mother had taught her better though, and she kept silent about what she personally thought of the stranger and their odd prophesies.

Finally the one she’d been waiting for arrived, a bunch of notes and papers trailing after them. He eyed Qutey, and got right to business.

“The Legend of Grakkor..” he murmered, eyes glazing over some what. “Tell me girl, what do you know of it.. ” Qutey tried to think back, it had been a while since she’d had any sort of history lessons. She shrugged, letting the newcomer know she knew very little to nothing at all about this legend.

“Ah, foolish child,” he coughed and started shuffling through his bags. “Do they not teach any more these days,” he continued to mummer under his breath, pulling papers out and tossing them towards Qutey so that she was forced to catch them or they’d fall to the ground in the mud. “Read those,” he said with a flicker of annoyance in his voice. “Then you will learn of the Legend of Grakkor, and why it is so important to the clan Martok.” He said no more, and left Qutey standing there wondering after him. She looked at the booklets in her hands and winced. It was going to be a long night.

(( Ok, so the little Rp blurb actually had very little to do with why Qutey likes to pick pocket lint off of people, but it was amusing none the less. I’ve been having a lot of fun with the rogue, she’s now sitting at level 8, with 22 diplomacy. No crafting quite yet. The starter zone is still one of the better ones I’ve seen besides Tanvu. The lore is interesting, the quests are fun, and she’s died a handful of times but it hasn’t bothered me. Game is unfortunately coming down for an emergency patch so I can’t play her too much more right now. ))

The Latest Addition – Qutey Patootie, Rogue of Martok

stargrace February 15, 2007 3Comments

Isn’t she a little Qutey?

I finally managed to grind my necromancer to 10. It was.. not fun. I really was not enjoying the dark elf starter city at all. So I decided I’d start a few more classes and find the one that stood out to me. Granted, maybe I’m just not the sort of person who ever has that happen. In WoW (as you can see by the character sheets listed under quick links) I had an abundance of characters, same with EQ2. So why would Vanguard be any different — even if I was trying to change my alt-ness ways. I made a druid and quickly grew bored of her, fun, but it was just like playing any other nuker. It was very different to be wearing cloth as a druid instead of leather, and to be nuking instead of healing. Almost every game I’ve played has the druid as a healer. The unique take on this was fun. I’ll probably pick that character up again once I’m bored of my latest trial.

Meet Qutey Patootie, above. A goblish rogue who skulks around stabbing at things. Sneak and hide remind me very very much of my rogue back in EQ1, where you had to work the skills up or you were detected. There’s a few small bugs. Number one being — when you are sneaking and hiding, there is no real indication as to whether or not the mobs actually see you. Their names remain red, agro to you. When you sneak a little closer to them — if they have the chance to see you (especially if you come up at them from the front) little question marks will fly about their head as though they’ve heard something, and they will look directly at you, or if you’re close, they’ll charge you and break your stealth. So there’s some indication. But if you’re just wandering around, they all still look aggressive.

After reading this post on weaknesses and how to exploit them, I found myself teamed up with a monk. Low and behold, monks have a move that I can exploit with one of my level 2 skills. That was fun. I did notice one other small bug, as I was fighting, on a random encounter it said I had done a legendary attack.. and at level 5 — which was astounding to me — I hit the mob for 700 damage roughly at first, and then finished it off for another 600 damage.. at level 5?! That just did not seem right to me, I couldn’t understand it. Not that I was about to complain!

The goblin starter city is a lot of fun. The quests there pay far more then the ones in any other starting zone I’ve been to paid. Maybe to entice those who find the race ugly? I was getting on average 70-80 copper per level 5-6 quest. My necromancer didn’t get paid that amount until level 8-9 quests. So Qutey is sitting comfortably at 6 silver and some change. I’m finding the rogue a lot of fun, and perhaps this will be one of those characters I actually level to some degree. Martok (the starting point) is wide and open, with lots of places to explore, having stealth makes this a whole lot easier. Hopefully as I develop the character some, I’ll get around to writing some rp stories about the gal. We’ll have to see how it goes.

Now that’s a Skeleton – and Views on the Dark Elf Starter City

stargrace February 14, 2007 6Comments

My little level 9 necromancer, standing beside a giant skeleton for one of her quests. Now, I have a level 10 blood mage and a few other characters. I have started in a lot of new zones, and the dark elf one by far just.. sucks.

I’m level 9 and the only quests I have left are mainly diplomacy (she’s only sitting at a skill of 27 right now), and the adventuring ones she has are a lot bigger then her. I’ve tried to group up for them but no one seems interested. I’m looking forward to being slightly higher level so I can at least join my friends who are off adventuring all over. Anyhow.

The majority of the dark elf quests also do not have locations that show up on your map. They’ll say ‘in a canyon close to here’, and then you get to wander around and find out it’s not actually close to there at all. Or they’ll say ‘go find so and so, he’s east of this outpost’. It’s late though and you log off, the next morning you go back to the quest, you’re no where near the original outpost and the quest has no way to show you where that is, thus you are not even sure where the second outpost that you need to head to is.

I’d also say there’s a lack of quests. For my blood mage she ended up finding two npc’s who had no less then 10 level 8-10 quests on them, she got her levels easily and painlessly. The necromancer is struggling along, the quests are difficult, and there are not very many. Not in comparison to the other classes I’ve played at least. I was going to scrap the necro all together and remake a different race just to get out of their starter city, but decided I’d stick it out until 10 and see if it got any easier.

My blood mage was also a hell of a lot easier to level solo then the necro, while I applaud Vanguard’s idea to make the healer classes more ‘fun’ and unique, there’s no reason why a healer should be able to heal better then anyone else in the game – and dps – and tank. Which is exactly what a lot of healers are doing. It’s a wonderful way to keep people interested, but why bother being anything else, when you can be a healer and just simply do it all.

Ok, enough of that rant. On a completely different note — I finally understand crafting. That’s right, you heard it here first! After struggling with it since release, I sat down and spent a few hours working on it yesterday. I did refining and finishing work orders, started with the easy ones and worked up slightly to moderate. I didn’t bother with anything harder then that for the time being. The experience started going very slowly, but I still had fun. I made more coin then I ever had adventuring, and bought myself some new gear upgrades and 10-slot bags with it. Also got the necromancer to level 6 artificer. It was fun. So I’m finally at least comfortable in the game. Here’s hoping they’re going to be fixing bugs. There’s plenty of lore and story lines if you look for them, especially with diplomacy. It’s easy to get into a role play mode and create an elaborate background for yourself simply following those. For example the dark elves are testing the blood of their race to see if they’re worthy and all this stuff. There’s been an outlaw I’ve been helping because his wife was not found worthy or what have you, but now she’s dead and he’d like to come back to the city, so the guards said he could — if — he defeated some bird thing that’s way up on a cliff (where I would have to fight level 10 ^^^ just to get to him). So yeah, there are certainly a lot of stories around. I still hate the starter zone though.

Hopscotch – Free Diplomacy Horse

stargrace February 13, 2007 2Comments

Hopscotch, Satia’s new horse

Have I mentioned that I love diplomacy? I have? Just once or twice, right? Well, let me mention it again. I’m taking my time with Vanguard, I really have no other choice. I some how found myself surrounded by quests yesterday and as I diligently did each one the experience climbed until I managed to move myself from level 7 to level 10 (and half way through that). I got a lot of new skills, some interesting, some confusing. Finishing blows, which are of course self explanatory. Parts of chains.. which still elude me. A new stance, that takes 5% of my health and transfers it into energy (mana). I’m basically a cross between a healer, and a necromancer. I also got my first rez. I have a skill that lets me boil my own blood and make vials of it. Then those vials are used as a reagent in another spell that lets me avoid all damage for 6 seconds and mitigate 10% of the damage back to my opponents. I have sets of heals that I can only use on other people, which is a unique idea to me.

So I worked on my diplomacy until I got it to a skill of 40, and then was told I could acquire a free horse if I wanted! Of course I jumped at that chance. It required a lot of traveling, I left Tanvu and took the port at the dock to Ca’ial Brael, then headed towards my quest npc. He lent me a horse, and I did some fast courier type quests, then I was told that if I wanted to do more, I could — but I’d have to reach level 10 in either adventuring or crafting first. Hence my mad questing to get to level 10. Once I’d gotten it I returned to the npc and was sent on another courier quest, to deliver 3 items and of course parle with each of them as well (and win).

With my skill nearing 47 now, and theirs at 50, it was pretty simple. I had 23 minutes left on my 40 minute timer. Turned it in, and ta da, Hopscotch. I claimed my new horse shoes for her, and equipped my saddle bags, which apparently you can fill and keep with you if you die — not certain about this though I’ve not tried it. I’m glad I didn’t have to save up coin for this new mount, there’s no way I’d be able to afford it. I’m down to 7s after purchasing my level 10 spells. Still having some issues making money. I’m going to attempt crafting again today — maybe. A few more of my friends have been talking about how much fun it is, so we’ll see how it goes!

Working along..

stargrace February 12, 2007 1Comment

Working my way through Vanguard, has been interesting. Crafting is pretty much the last thing I feel that I should learn how to master, even though I haven’t really grouped up very much yet. I did get a guild invite on my bloodmage but declined. When it comes to choosing a guild I want to know what I’m getting into. A friend of mine invited me to their guild but it’s absolutely huge, and I’m not really looking for something that already has over 100 members. I’d just get lost in there. Speaking of guilds, there’s been a whole lot of drama with my old raiding guild on EQ2, who broke up due to Vanguard being released and leadership moving on. They’re all trying to cover it up, saying recruitment lacked, and they didn’t have enough for raids (when they were sitting members out due to having more then the required 24, and kicking out people they deemed unfit for their idea of a raiding guild) when what it came down to was lack of interest in Eq2 on their parts. A lot of people’s feelings were hurt, and I can’t say I blame them. At least if they had of just admitted it was the new game, and not tried to shift the blame onto other things (that can be worked around if any of them actually had any interest) people would be slightly more understanding. It’s not a bad thing that they’ve moved on, I can understand it, but they handled it very poorly.

In real life news, I am back home! So thankful to be here too. There’s no place like home, it was great to sleep in my own bed for once. I wasn’t so sure my kitty would remember who I was, but after a few minutes hiding under the bed she finally seemed to remember. 

Still lots of issues with Vanguard, and they haven’t done any patching in a few days. I hope they’re going to continue fixing some of the major bugs. I’ve managed to get to 40 diplomacy, except there’s one quest I can’t seem to finish. A woman in Tanvu (I may have spelled that wrong, I forget now) wants me to find out why her soldiers are not working. There’s a mysterious house they’re all standing around, afraid to go inside. I’ve beaten all of their arguments, even hers (who has a skill level of 40) numerous times now, but the quest won’t update. It says to continue interviewing each of the guards until she deems the situation solved. I don’t know if perhaps I have to win every single argument without failing any in between for it to update or if it’s broken or what. The reward is quite a few pieces of diplomacy gear, which I’m really looking forward to.

Another diplomacy quest rewarded me with a 12 slot bag, now THERE was something I could use! I’d been walking around with the default bag and some 4-slots since creation. I seem to always be broke, which is something I need to adventure for a little bit more. Diplomacy doesn’t pay that well, not that you really need it to I suppose. I’ve got a couple of silver to my name. The bloodmage is still one of the best classes I’ve tried so far, so I think I’ll stick with it and see where I go.

In the mean time I’ve also been playing a little WoW, I still love the PvP there, and it’s lack of complexity is a joy after trying to figure things out in Vanguard.